Following the loss of its Fox Broadcasting Co. affiliation, Nexstar Broadcasting's KSFX-TV is retooling its efforts and will become KOZL-TV, or Ozarks Local, effective Sept. 1.
Ozarks Local's programming will comprise local news, sports, weather, and lifestyle and entertainment programming. The station also will show original feature-oriented weekly programming alongside syndicated and prime-time television shows, according to a news release.
In a phone interview with Springfield Business Journal reporter Brian Brown, Mark Gordon, general manager of Ozarks Local, said the new station is focusing its efforts on becoming a leader in locally produced programming.
“We are going to become a much stronger local television station," Gordon said. "Most stations are tied to networks and your network contract does not allow you to control very much of your programming. Because of that, we have an opportunity to do much more local programming."
Scheduled news programming includes primetime newscasts at 9 p.m. seven days a week; a Sunday newscast at 6 p.m.; Ozarks Local: The Morning Rush, a live news broadcast airing 7-9 a.m.; and a Sunday business newscast, dubbed Ozarks Local Business Journal, at 6:30 p.m..
“We are going to double our news production from 12 hours to 24 hours of news in a week’s time,” Gordon said. “We are going to hire five more people to make that happen.”
The station would include two local, half-hour sports shows: Ozarks Sports Saturday and Ozarks Sports Sunday, both at 10:30 p.m. The station also will air college sports games, the release said.
Gordon said programming fees being implemented by Fox Broadcasting Co. were too much for Nexstar to handle, which led to the cancelation of the KSFX contract as a Fox affiliate.
“It was a huge issue. We chose to not meet what they wanted us to pay. Long-term, it didn’t make good business sense,” Gordon said, though he declined to say how much Fox was hiking its rates. [[In-content Ad]]
